So I Choke On Sun
by wormbuffet
Summary: Dib finally gets what he wants. Zim's POV, suggested slash.


This is my first Jhonen-verse fic in about three years. I got randomly inspired and couldn't resist pounding this out. It's from Zim's POV, and yes, it's not exactly canon cos he isn't screaming and raging...but I was feeling gloomy and stoned. Thus, ENJOY.

* * *

I am dimly aware of the clink of instruments. Above me, a huge white light burns my sensitive eyes. Dib's gloved hands run down the plane of my abdomen, pause, then I feel a little wet scratch of a marker. He draws a thin dotted line down my middle, his little pink tongue sticking out in concentration. It reminds me of back in fifth grade, when I first came to Earth, and he would draw pictures of himself dissecting me and throw them at me, folded into little paper airplanes. So much time has passed. We're older now.

He pulls the white cloth covering my lower half down, and continues making little marks. Marks he will trace later with the scalpel. Gaz appears on my other side, placing electrodes on my temples and wrists. I cannot speak. I cannot move. I can't feel anything at all below the surface of my skin. Dib caps the marker with a little 'pop' and shoves it behind his ear. He rubs his hands together.

"Assistant?"

Gaz looks up from her task. Dib holds out his hands, and she sprays sanitizer on them, then pulls long, black rubber gloves all the way up to his forearm. She places goggles over his eyes, which mask the beautiful honey colour that ultimately lead me to this, my downfall. He looks so much his father now. He would have been proud.

"Let's begin. Subject species, Irken. Height, five-four. Weight, ninety pounds."

He runs a hand down between my legs, to the dual sex organ.

"Hermaphrodite."

The hands run up to my abdomen, along my neck, trace the smooth skin of my face. A ghost of tenderness. I remember once…

"Subject appears to lack a nose, ears, lips, and nails." He observes to the recording computer. "Let's open him up and find out what else he's missing." He looks at Gaz and nods, who reaches into the metal tray to her left and hands him the first scalpel.

"Making first incision along the solar plexus…" he intones. Dib places the scalpel at the top of the very first mark, then swivels his head to stare at me. My eyes, no matter how hard I will them to weep, remain dry. He stares hard into my eyes. I cannot read his expression beneath the green goggles. It is as alien as my own dry red saucers that burn back at his. Although I have already accepted my fate hours ago, some tiny part of my mind clings to the hope he will stop now. That he will see me, remember Skool and Mrs. Bitters and meat, remember the time at prom when he had no-one else to take but his sister, the time he got drunk and came to my house and kissed me, the time I got drunk and came to his house and he trapped me in a glorified mason jar… I will him to remember the pain that had welled behind my eyes then, before I buried it down like the Irken Invader I am.

But he doesn't.

He shakes his head, as if brushing away an unwanted thought, and presses the blade deep into my skin. He draws it smoothly down to my pubic bone. His hands do not shake. I had always wondered if he really wanted to kill me, if he would really go through with it if he ever captured me. Now I see that Dib has grown up, and dark green bubbles from the incision. Dib snaps his gloved fingers.

"Pins."

Gaz leans over and pins the folds of my skin back and away, exposing my insides to the sterile laboratory air as Dib wipes his hands. He licks his lips.

"So. Let's see how he's put together."

Dib the scientist, Dib the paranormal investigator, Dib the unpopular highschool student, Dib the misunderstood child, Dib the only kid in fifth grade who's parents couldn't be there for career day except for me. I feel his fingers probe my insides, run gently over my heart, trace arteries, tubes, veins. If there were anyone I would allow to touch my heart, it would be him. And he does. Gaz stands to the side, holding a tray, her gaze drifting lazily around the room. Gaz never really cared about anything. Here she stands, over the body of a dying alien, her childhood friend, and her eyes are glazed with disinterest.

"Amazing. The composition is completely unlike ours." Dib says enthusiastically, lifting a loop of my cooling system and dropping it back with a splash. "Camera?"

Gaz puts down the tray and disappears from my field of vision. I am strapped down tightly and cannot move my head to follow her, but I hear rustling, then she's back. She hands it to Dib.

"Hmm…"

He aims it at my open chest and abdomen, puts his finger on the shutter, and then pauses. He lowers the camera. He looks up at Gaz.

"Whup, I almost left the lens cap on again." He says, and does that little half-hearted giggle of his. He unscrews the lens cap, hands it to Gaz, and the flash blinds me momentarily.

"Wow…" I hear him say admiringly. I feel his hands running gently over the surfaces of my organs, probing here and there. There is no pain. Only the consciousness of pressure. I am grateful for this, probably the only decent thing Dib has done for me in years. His fingers push against my spooch gland, nudging organs apart to get a better look at my heart. "I can't believe how complicated it all is…Computer, are you recording this?" he turns to glance at the screen to confirm, and I feel his finger tug on my main artery.

"Confirmed. Recording. Continue streaming to the Swollen Eyeball?" the automated voice asks.

"What?" Dib asks, turning fully around, hands still deep inside me. The pressure on my artery increases. "Of course! And hey, are you getting my voice? Oh geez, this better be in colour!-"

My artery rips free, twisted out of place. There is pain. Searing, mind-wrenching pain. My blood jets out in a thick green arc and sprays across the side of his face. Dib whips back around with a gasp. He jerks his hands out of me, his mouth falling open in dismay as he displaces more of my organs with his careless haste.

"Oh shit! Gaz, Gaz, what's happening? Oh my God!" he puts his bloody hands to the sides of his face in the classic boy-out-of-his-element gesture. "Oh fuck! He's bleeding!"

He reaches back down and tries to find the artery, but there's so much blood now it's impossible. My life's blood continues to spray into the air, and Dib begins to panic. He sweeps the blood pooling over my exposed organs, squinting through his goggles to try and find the source. Gaz mops the lenses of his goggles and his face. Beneath his breath, he begins to whimper. His scientific composure disappears as he realizes the gravity of the situation. The machines around us are all going haywire, flashing grim data.

"Oh God, oh God, oh God," he whines. My vision starts to blur. "Oh God, Gaz, what are we doing? He's dying!"

"So? You were dissecting him, Dib. It's a risk."

"I- I didn't…want…this!" covers his eyes with his gloved bloody hands. Gone is the grown-up, scientific Dib Membrane. "Everything is ruined!"

"It's okay, we still have the picture from when he was intact. Once he bleeds out, we can reconstruct it later."

"No! That's not what I mean!" Dib throws his hands up hysterically. He kicks one of the tables over, sending instruments flying. "What the hell are we doing? We've fucking killed him! We killed Zim!"

He rubs his hands over the green, glowing lenses, but blood blinds him completely. He pushes the goggles up over his forehead and leans over me. His face blots out the blinding white glare from above.

"Zim…" he whispers, horrified.

I try to inhale, but the blood has seeped into my lungs, and all I can see are the golden orbs of his eyes. They look like the sun.

So I choke on sun.


End file.
